New and Exciting
by silverbranches
Summary: Nothing new and exciting ever happened in the small town of Avalon, and Gwen was perfectly fine with that. Then one day, someone new comes to town.


**Disclaimer: Merlin doesn't belong to me.**

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Nothing ever happened in the sleepy little town of Avalon. The most exciting time of year was summer, when the tourists and the rich decided to take a break from their hectic lives and spend a week by the lake. For the rest of the year, the town was quiet. Peaceful. Ordinary.

Gwen Leodegrance loved it.

She supposed it was odd, that she didn't have this burning itch to escape the town and make a name for herself. That she would rather live her entire life here, in Avalon, than go and explore the world.

Maybe it was because being in this town felt _right_, a feeling that she never had when she traveled to the big cities for a weekend away. It was strange, and her friends would have laughed if she had told them that the reason she didn't join in on their plans for leaving Avalon was because some little feeling told her not to.

So she convinced herself that the _real_ reason she stayed in Avalon was because it was practical. After all, she didn't have enough money to live somewhere new, without a job, for who knows how long. She stayed because it was the smart thing to do, and nobody argued with that. When her friends all left to "discover their true purpose" in places like London and Birmingham, she stayed behind making dresses in the backroom of the clothing shop she worked in, just like it had always been.

* * *

Over the years, her days had fallen into a sort of routine. She would wake up, get ready, buy a cup of coffee from the café on the corner, work in the dress shop until after closing, then go home and maybe read a book until she fell asleep. She smiled at everyone she saw, and made polite conversation when necessary, but other than that she spent her day alone. It was a bit boring, but Gwen didn't mind. She didn't need any excitement in her life.

Then one day, as she exited the coffee shop, she ran straight into the person who had been standing just outside the door. She gasped as the coffee spilt all over her and the person she had run into.

"I am _so_ sorry!" she apologized, quickly patting the worst of the coffee stains off her clothes before looking up to see who she had run into.

He was tall and skinny, and didn't look like he was that much older than her. He wore a brown jacket over a plain t-shirt, and had a kerchief tied around his neck to protect him from the wind. Strangely, he looked _happy_, even though most people would have been upset at having coffee spilt all over them.

"It's no problem," he assured her, taking the napkins she offered him. "I'll just throw it into the washing machine when I get home, and it'll be as good as new."

"Do you live around here?" she asked, then rushed to elaborate in case he took it the wrong way. "I mean, I've never seen you around town before, and the town is so small that I've seen just about everybody."

"I live in a small cottage, just outside town," he told her. "My grandfather used to own the place, but he recently passed away, so I sort of inherited it."

"You're Mr. Emrys' grandson?" Gwen asked. Nobody in town knew much about the old man. He had been there as long as anybody could remember, but mostly kept to himself, holed away in the little house that was built right by the lake. She hadn't even heard the he'd died.

"Yeah," he responded. "I'm Merlin." Misinterpreting the strange look she gave him, he said, "My mum really enjoyed the old legends of Camelot and King Arthur. She thought it would be cool to name me after the most powerful character of the story."

"Your mother and mine were very much alike, then," Gwen told him. At his questioning look, she explained, "I'm Guinevere, but most people call me Gwen." She ignored the sense that she had said this to him before, and offered him her hand.

"Nice to meet you, Gwen," he said, shaking her hand. "It'll be nice to have a friend in this town."

After a few more minutes of friendly conversation, he left, and Gwen went through the rest of her day without being able to shake the feeling that she had knew Merlin from somewhere else.

* * *

Even with all the excitement of Merlin's arrival, life around town went on as normal. Gwen stuck to her routine, the only difference being that Merlin would sometimes join her for a cup of coffee or pop in for a visit at the shop. He was quite nice and funny, but sometimes, when he thought she wasn't looking, she would catch him looking at her with something like sadness in his eyes. Then in the next minute, it would be gone, and he would be back to the laughing Merlin she had come to know.

Two weeks after Merlin came, there was another new arrival in town. Moving vans were parked outside the house next to Gwen's, and workers were seen coming in and out. But nobody had seen the mysterious new owner, and the gossip mill was running. People said he was a fugitive, or horribly disfigured, or…the stories went on and on, getting more and more ludicrous as they went. Gwen had finally had enough, so she decided to find out for herself what her new neighbor was like.

She knocked sharply on the door that was emblazoned with the number 65. She waited, but then her courage failed her, and she turned to leave when the door opened. Her first though when she saw the mysterious resident of number 65 was that the stories of his disfigurement were horribly untrue. He was the handsomest man she had ever seen, with blond hair that fell charmingly into blue eyes.

HE cleared his throat, and Gwen flushed when she realized she'd been staring. To cover up her embarrassment, she stuck out her hand and introduced herself.

"Hi! I'm your neighbor, number 64. Well, that's not my name, obviously. My name is Guinevere, but you can call me Gwen. Most people do."

She trailed off when she noticed that she was rambling a bit. She flushed again – why couldn't she stop embarrassing herself around him? It wasn't like she had never seen a handsome man before.

Luckily, he seemed too kind to comment on her habit of making a fool of herself, or he just chose not to notice it.

"I'm Arthur," he told her. "Would you like to come in?"

She accepted, following him into the living room. It was decorated in deep reds and golds, making the large space feel cozy.

"Would you like anything to drink?" he asked. "Tea? Coffee? Water?"

"Just water, than you." Arthur nodded, and disappeared into the kitchen, returning with a glass of water. Settling down on the couch across from her, he seemed content to sit in silence, leaving her to try and come up with a topic of conversation.

"So…why did you move to Avalon? It's not exactly anyone's first choice when looking for a place to stay."

"My father died." He said it bluntly, without emotion, but Gwen thought she saw a flicker of grief pass over his face.

"I-I'm sorry," Gwen stammered. "I didn't realize – "

Arthur shrugged. "To be honest, my father and I weren't always on the best of terms It's jus that – well, with everything that happened, I needed to get away, so I got a map and decided to move to the first small town my finger landed on. Now here I am."

Gwen smiled at him. "Well, Avalon is the perfect place to get away. I'm sure you'll be very happy here."

Arthur smiled back at her, a real smile that made something flutter inside Gwen. "You know what's strange?" he asked. "I think I will be."

Nothing ever happened in the sleepy little town of Avalon. It was a quiet town. Peaceful. Ordinary. That was one of the reasons Gwen loved it so much.

But, she mused, thinking about the secret look in Merlin's eyes and Arthur's smile, maybe it was time for things to start changing around here.

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_Thanks for reading! I'd love to hear what you think!_


End file.
